One Word Images have caught on. I’ve been doing them since I first started them in 2002, but only lately have they become a basic CI strategy. Here are some additional thoughts about them as they have developed in my mind over the years, for those teachers in the PLC who may want to refine how they currently use them.
- Work on pacing. Allow yourself to go slowly. Walk to the words first. Put your hand on the word before you say it. Count at least four seconds between each word or word chunk. This technique has developed in recent years into Walk Before You Talk, which guarantees that your students understand you (use the search bar for more on Walk Before You Talk, one of my newest ideas in CI).
- There is a feeling in a really good one word image of “trying to figure it out” as a group, of trying to understand what the image looks like. It is a kind of group wonderment. But the trick is to indicate to them at the same time that YOU already know what it looks like.
- If your artist is not of high quality, forget doing this strategy. Don’t do an image. Do a reading class or something else. No good artist(s) means no good image.
- Taste the words. If this doesn’t resonate with you as I’ve written here in other posts, don’t taste the words.
- Work on voice quality, which can do so much to encourage interest. Put joy in your voice. Put curiosity in your voice. This leads to a more musical quality in the questioning. Enjoy bringing the object into existence. You don’t have to dance and prance, but do cultivate an interesting, engaged vocal tone and timbre.
- Do not turn it into a one person show; make a conversation out of it. This is a two way street and not a chance for you to be a Dallas Cowboys cheerleader. If you are reserved in your general style as a teacher, this is best for the OWI/Invisibles process and for CI in general. It allows the group to be more cohesive instead of being entertained by a histrionic freak in front of the classroom, which is off-putting. I’m so tired of teachers who think that what we do is a stage show.
- Bring in genuine eye contact. Make it real. This is very hard to do. Andrew Rosene of Charlotte, NC once said: “If you are truly teaching to the eyes, then you will know what to say next.” It’s kind of the ultimate comment about non-targeted input. It is a triumphant statement that refutes the idea that our students need a bunch of counted reps of targeted vocabulary in order to acquire the word. It is a statement in favor of the power of genuine human interaction in the foreign language classroom over mere mechanical ways to teach a language. I thank Andrew for that sentence. It’s a real zinger.
- Respect the space. Use your hands. Don’t let the space move around, which confuses the kids. Always draw their attention back to the exact space where the image is being built.
- Ask the questions in order. Use the OWI prompts in the order they are written.
- Own the space. This was touched on above. Act like you already know what the image looks like before it is completed, but make the students guess what you are “thinking”.
- Use your Professeur 2. Work closely with her.
- If the object is small, make sure the artist uses a magnifying glass, ruler, giant hand, small buildings, etc. around it or other clever way of showing its small size by contrast.
- If the object is small, build it on a stool in the OWI creation space.
- If the OWI is happy, then later in the story when you create the problem, just take away from the character whatever it is that makes them happy. This creates a problem. But it’s easier to make the OWI sad as per question 4 in the questioning prompt process.